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Health insurance for tens of thousands of Alabama kids extended for a month

Anniston Star, The (AL)

Dec. 22--A short-term funding bill Congress passed Thursday should give the state's health insurance program for 80,000 children a month's reprieve before it runs out of money.

Cathy Caldwell, director of the state ALL Kids program, funded by the federal Children's Health Insurance Program, said she didn't yet have exact funding numbers, but that her office should receive enough money to last through Jan. 19.

Also, because of the extra money, ALL Kids won't freeze new enrollment Jan. 1 or shut its doors entirely on Feb. 1 as previously planned, Caldwell said.

"It's absolutely not a permanent solution," Caldwell said, referring to the impending end of the program. "But it's a little bit of additional funding ... we're being told three to four weeks' worth that will bridge us to Jan. 19."

Congress missed the Sept. 30 deadline to fully renew the popular CHIP program, which provides health insurance for around 9 million children in the U.S. In Alabama, ALL Kids provides health insurance for 80,000 children based on their poverty level, with money provided through CHIP.

More than 3,300 kids in Calhoun County had some form of CHIP insurance in August of this year, according to state statistics.

Without full funding, the program had been set to end Feb. 1. The short-term bill will extend the overall CHIP program through March,

ALL Kids had planned to notify parents in the program on Dec. 26 about the previously expected end of the program on Feb.1.

"We won't send those out now," Caldwell said. "We instructed that those stop being printed first thing this morning."

Donald Williamson, CEO of the Alabama Hospital Association, said he suspects that Congress will soon provide more funding for the program, hopefully enough for the next five years.

"Predicting what the U.S. Congress is going to do is not a certainty, but CHIP has been one of the more popular things Congress has done on health care in a long, long time," Williamson said. "Because of that, I do think Congress is going to do a long-term extension."

At least with the short-term spending bill, Congress has the time to devise a more permanent solution, Williamson said.